


maybe you turn to ashes

by lilliputianmerriell



Category: The Pacific (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Angels, Character Death, M/M, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Wings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 07:19:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16321667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilliputianmerriell/pseuds/lilliputianmerriell
Summary: “Am I dead?”“Yeah, sorry boo. I’m your ride to the Silver City.”





	maybe you turn to ashes

**Author's Note:**

> Reuploaded from [ my Tumblr](https://lilliputianmerriell.tumblr.com/)
> 
> This started with [ an edit ](https://lilliputianmerriell.tumblr.com/post/179127637042/am-i-dead-yeah-sorry-boo-im-your-ride-to) that just kind of took on a life of it's own and now we are here, over 1k words later. Edit can be found on my tumblr.
> 
> Title taken from "Ashes" by Claire Guerreso.

Eugene stares transfixed at the scene in front of him, his mind struggling to wrap itself around what his eyes were telling him.

The whole battlefield was in chaos, bursting with fire from machine guns and shells dropping at steady intervals. In the middle of it all the violence had stopped where Eugene saw someone strikingly similar to himself lying knocked out on the ground. Bill was screaming for a medic, his body draped across the bleeding chest of the ginger man bearing the striking resemblance to Eugene. Burgie was somewhere further away, his legs scrambling towards the pale corpse, shouting something along the way. All the while, Snafu – his dear Merriell – was staring at the bloody, beaten body in a trance, his pale eyes wide and unblinking. If he didn’t move soon, he was going to get struck by a bullet too.

Time seems to stop suddenly as everything around him comes to a screeching halt, becoming deafeningly quiet. Burgie is frozen in place as he leaps over another fallen marine and Eugene can no longer hear the desperate pleas from Bill between the explosions and screams from the battlefield.  

Someone tsk from behind Eugene, a familiar drawl crawling through the air and sending a shiver down Eugene’s spine. “Gunshot wound is such an impersonal way to go. I miss the good ol’ days where people were impaled by arrows and swords, had a lot more appeal to it. Made my job a hell of a lot easier too. This whole war with bombs and guns has me running around like a headless chicken.”

Eugene turns to look at the speaker.

This Snafu was clean with big curls and bright, glimmering eyes. He wasn’t wearing his dungarees but was rather covered head to toe in a black suit and coat that complimented his tawny skin. He was almost unrecognisable without all the blood and mud.

“Am I dead?”

“Yeah, sorry boo. I’m your ride to the Silver City.”

“Are you… the Grim Reaper?”

Snafu’s face twists with disdain, as if those words were offensive to him somehow. “I’d prefer the Angel of Death, but whatever. I go by many names, but I’d rather not get into it. People tend to get touchy when it comes to religious discourse, and let me tell you, it makes the whole travel unnecessary uncomfortable.”

“You’re Death,” Eugene states incredulously. Somehow the prospect of Snafu, the snarky man with a severe lack of self-preservation, the man who Eugene had been sharing his bed with for the past few months, being an archangel seemed almost comical. Impossible even. He might very possibly be experiencing shock. “Death kills people.”

“Listen, the religious texts give me a bad rep. I am literally just a glorified escort. I don’t actually do the killing part. That’s all you guys. You mortals manage fine on your own.”

Snafu seems to have completely missed the point of Eugene’s disbelief, having obviously thought that Eugene was blaming him for his death rather than trying to understand what was happening right now – Eugene had been killed and Snafu was the Angel of Death that was there to collect his soul.

“Oh my god, I died.” Eugene’s legs start to quake underneath him, making him feel like he was about to collapse any second as the realisation hits him like a freight train. “I'm dead.” He turns to look back at where his body – his very much dead body – was lying, still frozen in time along with the rest of the world.

“Don’t we sound like a broken record today? C’mon Gene, you’re a smart guy. I’m kind of on a tight schedule, and it ain’t exactly advanced physics I am asking you to get here. A bullet straight to the heart, you didn’t feel nothing.”

Something about that Snafu’s words pulls at Eugene’s heartstrings. Maybe it was the cold, unfeelingness of them, the unsympathetic, unapologetic tone. They didn’t belong in the mouth of the man Eugene knew. “You’re not sad? That I’m dead.”

Snafu visibly wince at this statement, his mask finally cracking a bit. “It doesn’t matter what I think. I am only the messenger.”

“Answer my question. Don’t you care?” Eugene’s raises his voice, the raw emotion making it crack at the end as he is no longer quite able to contain the panic and hurt he was feeling.

“I do. And that’s the problem. Us angels, we ain’t supposed to get attached to mortals. Messes with this whole thing.” Snafu gestures between the two of them, his face regretful. “I was warned to stay away from you, but you intrigued me.”

“Why?”

Snafu’s mouth quirks up into a self-deprecating smile. “Do you know many times you’ve cheated me, Death? I thought I was going to collect you before you were even born. Your heart was going to give in before you were even out of the womb. Yet, you survived. Time and time again.” The smile slips away to give way to a more serious look, and Snafu suddenly looks weighted down by all his years and years. “I kept a close eye on you, y’know. As I said, I didn’t plan to get attached, but then you risked your life to save mine. Dragged my pathetic ass across that airfield like your own life didn’t even matter. You know the rest of the story.”   

Eugene must still be in shock. There is no other explanation as to why he so easily accepts that Snafu, his bedfellow and comrade, was actually an ancient divine entity who had been watching over him his whole life.

“What will happen now?” He hears himself ask, his voice sounding faint to his own ears as he thinks about the awful scene taking place behind him, still frozen in time. He was going to miss out on how it was going to end, if there would ever even be a victor amongst all this bloodbath.

“This isn’t the end. Only the beginning.”

Eugene gasps in wonder as large, feathery wings sprout from Snafu’s back, spanning close to eight feet as Snafu stretches them out to their full length behind himself. They were mesmerising, the mix of blacks, golds, silvers and whites melding together in all the feathers giving the impression of a clear night sky as the colour rippled each time the wings moved. They were begging Eugene to reach out and let himself be swallowed up in their comfort.

Casting one last, furtive look back at his own body his heart stutters in shock at the sight of another body next to his. Snafu’s body – still clad in those filthy dungarees and covered in grime and blood – is lying next to Eugene’s dead one. Snafu’s chest was bleeding just like his.

Eugene whirls back around to look at Snafu, desperate for some sort of explanation as to why Snafu would leave this world just like that. He couldn’t possibly be abandoning it because of Eugene, could he? Was Death sacrificing his own chance at life to be with him?

Snafu offers Eugene his hand in reply, a small, unusually gentle smile on his face as his wings twitch with anticipation of flight behind him. “Ready, Eugene?”


End file.
